School of Hard Knocks (Blue)

You're beautiful you know that..?

Blue blushed. Severely. She knew that people found her hot, and good looking. But it wasn't everyday someone called a girl like Blue beautiful. She was touched. Some of his earlier words were harshened less because of this. Because this, was the John that she had sworn she had been getting to know before he went off on her for no real good reason. It hurt, those things he had said, but she had to admit, it was worth it almost for this.

I think that would have been a hard move to make. I did not particularly like you weeks ago. she teased softly.

A small smile on her face as they looked at each other. It was just.. warm here. She felt safe. She knew that he protected her, and maybe that was something that she had grown to secretly like. She still felt about the same when it came to having someone hover her all the time at work. But then, there was something else, something in the fact that here he was. Being warm and soft, this was a John Rivers that she had known had to be in there somewhere.

Blue laughed when he mentioned that they must have both been thinking about kissing to make this seem so familiar. She couldn't help it. She gave a little shrug.

Mayyybe. she teased with a little coy grin on her face.

He mumbled something about talking and not kissing and then fixed it. Because in seconds they were kissing again and she wrapped one of her arms around him pulling him as close to her as possible. His hand was on her neck, her pulse threading quickly underneath his thumb as they continued to kiss. Because, this was hot, unexpected, and hot. She couldn't help but be turned on by all of this business. He parted her lips with his tongue taking the kiss even deeper. His hand found hers, fingers laced.

The hand that he was not holding did something she had wanted to do .. well for a while. Especially after the hospital when she saw him without a shirt on for a while because the nurses had changed his bandages. She let her hand slide down from his hair and run across this throat and onto the bare spot of chest that was exposed by the Gi that he wore. Her hand lightly carressing the skin that she could find there. It had been one of those things that she had really wanted to do, and it was just as she had hoped it would be. While they kissed each other on the soft velvet mats of the dojo.

The Loooove Dojo.

Time was a funny thing, the way its perception changed based on what you were doing. Kisses and romantic encounters always seemed to drag out, to let you enjoy them more fully, and yet, when they were over...it always seemed far too short. "John" felt that way now, being held down by Blue on that mat of the dojo. Each movement of their lips, their tongues as they danced with one another almost seemed in slow motion. His hand softly on her neck, each beat of her heart felt slow and deliberate, but he knew in his mind that it racing.

He felt her caressing his chest softly with her fingers, and that forced a big smile on his face that nearly broke their current slew of kisses. After a couple more, Ethan let the kisses trail across her cheek and softly down her neck.

Your heart is racing...is that my fault? Blue, I had no idea.

Letting a smirk fall across his face, he watched her be beautiful as she played with the open part of his Gi with her fingers. It was one of those things, making a woman's heart race, that was just so satisfying. Who knew he could have such an effect on her.

Then it hit him. He made her heart race.

Oh, no.

Looking up for a moment, he spotted the disregarded locket. Moving for just a brief moment, He retrieved is and crawled back to her on the floor. Please...don't be what I think... he thought as he softly placed the locket on the skin below her neck.

PANIC ran through his mind.

Son of a bitch. I....guh. He put his forehead in to the mat next to hers. I...we...us. I got you excited enough to set off the panic button.

Pausing for a just a second, Ethan received no words saying otherwise. He didn't need her to confirm or deny what as going on...he already knew.

I am a massive asshole, aren't I?

If there was paradise.

It was currently on the floor of the dojo where she lay kissing John Rivers. She had never expected to even like John, much less, crush on him. There was no reason for her to. They fought almost constantly. She was mean, he was mean, and yet somehow mutual silent respect had turned into something more. At least she hoped so. Because while through the locket, which she wasn't wearing anymore, he could totally keep tabs on what she was feeling.. she did not have such a luxory.

Her heart was racing, as he soon found out with his hand against the skin of her neck. Her eyes looked up at him as he spoke aloud his findings. She blushed. Looking away, there was no need to say anything sometimes.

I .. didn't expect it.. either.

Then it dawned on him. Or almost did. Partially? She wasn't sure, he looked up and she watched his face as he searched the floor for the locket before he raced over to it. Then rushed back. He pressed it against her neck, and she knew what would happen. As happened in the beginning of most relationships... her heart was still racing from the bought of making out they had done on the floor. The panic button triggered again.

His head came down to the mat, by hers and she waited. Unsure of what he would say now that he really understood what had happened several times today. Each one, while they were touching one another, or almost kissing. Her heart would skip a beat, or go into over drive and trigger the button. One she hadn't expected to be a problem as she didn't think there was anthing between herself and John.

Blue sat up softly and brushed her hair off her shoulders and down her back in a smooth and gentle manner. She gave a shrug. He didn't need an answer from her, he had found it on his own. She took the locket gently from his fingers and disabled it. The panic alert would stop.

Don't worry. I will make sure it doesn't happen again. I will fix it when I get back to the lab soon. Tomorrow is my day off, and, so I'll have it fixed before then.

Blue got up off the floor and straightened her Gi. Hoping they were done with all this self defense non-sense for today. She really didn't mind being touched by him, but she also wasn't wanting any further instruction on the day.

Are we... are we done here? With the.. lesson for the day? she asked curiously, her voice was soft, still wounded, but there was little to be done about that. He had deeply wounded her. She would never. Ever. Purposefully hurt him like that. Or purposefully, sabotage him.

I probably need to get back to work.

Sitting up as Blue gathered herself, Ethan sat on his heels, silently cursing himself and his actions. Why would he do something so stupid!?! Sadly, thinking before acting was never his strong suit. In war, that line of action got you maimed, injured, or worse...and his current course of work hadn't helped his current situation with being smart in social situations.

Don't worry. I will make sure it doesn't happen again. I will fix it when I get back to the lab soon. Tomorrow is my day off, and, so I'll have it fixed before then.

Falling back on his bottom, Ethan leaned up against the wall in a sitting position, his knees drawn up a bit. Looking up at her with a flat, attempting to be unemotional face, Ethan nodded, muttering nothing in particular.

Are we... are we done here? With the.. lesson for the day?

Wha...? Oh, yeah, sure.

Blue walked off to the back to change, and once she was out of sight, "John" threw his head back in to the wall, hard. Pain that rang his head was quickly suppressed, and he shook his head before putting them in his hands.

Well done, John. Damn spectacular. He growled to himself as he rose and moved to the gentleman's changing room. Once inside, he threw a fist in to a nearby locker, filling the room with the sound of screaming metal. A slow drip of blood oozed from a small cut on his hand as Ethan stared at the locker, nearly caved in by the cybernetically enhanced punch.

He changed quickly and took a deep breath before meeting her in the main area of the dojo.

Ready?

Blue nodded.

Heading to the girls locker room she took a moment as the door closed behind her to let go. She had needed a good cry. Sinking down on the floor of the locker room with her back pressed into the door she let it go. Crying softly into her arms. She had liked him. Did.. like him. But she had Sol to think about. Though he had been gone for well over a week and she hadn't heard from him despite the messages that she had been leaving. She wasn't sure what had happened, but.. she still wanted to be loyal. And yet, things with John were weird.

First he kept going off on her. Saying horribly nasty things to her. And then in the next moment he was calling her beautiful, saying he was crazy about her, and then kissing her on the mats of the dojo.

Was he bi-polar?

Cybernetic melt down of the brain?

Blue quickly sobered herself. Having gotten the worst of the fustrations out she rose off the floor and washed her face with cold water hoping to eliminate the worse of the redness that came from crying one's eyes out in the bathroom.

How very high school of her.

Blue changed back into her tank top and shorts. The Gi, she supposed was a gift, and so she placed it gently back in the box. She hoped it smelled like him. Thoughts of sleeping in the torso portion came into her mind as she hugged the box to her chest and left the girls locker room about the same time that John left the mens. She nodded softly.

You're back though right? I mean.. you're coming back to the lab with me? Or.. or are you heading back home?

Blue hoped he was coming back. But she didn't know what to think of the whole situation. He hadn't asked her to stay on the floor. He hadn't taken her hand to reitterate anything once she had remembered what had gotten her on the floor in the first place. He hadn't said anything, except that they were done for the day and work was waiting. So she didn't take his hand. As much as she wanted to so they could head back to the car. Instead she hung onto her box like it was one of her most prized posessions and walked beside him quietly.

You're back though right? I mean.. you're coming back to the lab with me? Or.. or are you heading back home?

Ethan nodded, watching Blue hold on to the box the Gi was in tenderly.

Yeah, I'm here, until I get shot again. You don't have to take that with you...I have this dojo for two weeks. You could've left it in a locker.

She didn't reply, but quickly fell in step with him as they walked back towards his car. As they rounded the corner of the block, "John's" eyes narrowed, and he walked a little faster towards the car.

No! No no no no no....damnit! Look at the car....

The passenger side windows, both of them, had been smashed. The car looked thoroughly picked over, the glove box open and things strewn about. Could this day honestly get any worse? That exact thought rang in his head as he looked at Blue for some sort of moral support. She probably thought it was funny...knowing her.

They took a couple of minutes to clean the car, straighten it up as best they could, before heading off back to work. Ethan didn't say much as he gripped the steering wheel so hard it left imprints. As they pulled in to a parking space on the main campus, Ethan quickly got out of the car.

I'm going to go head to the motor pool about getting new windows. You think you can handle getting to the lab yourself?

He gave her the faintest smile, turned and headed towards the motor pool.

She didn't answer his comment about the Gi. She wasn't leaving it here. She would leave it at work. Where she could take it out when ever she wanted to. She didn't want to leave it here. It seemed so impersonal. Not like the gift was something overly personal but it meant something to her. Aside from the locket he had found in the dump .. there was nothing he had given her. She didn't get gifts often. And for some reason this Gi, was special.

As they got closer to the car, her sharp eyes picked out what had happened. He had left his car parked, there, unwatched, on the side of the street. And it had been vandalized. Windows broken and anything worth anything was taken out of it. He looked over at her, and she went into business mode looking through everything.

On the upside they didn't take the engine. It still runs, I can fix the rest, and replace some stuff. It isn't as bad as it seems.

he didn't seem too happy with her assessment. But she put her box gently in the back seat and worked to clean it up with him. Not saying anything. How had things turned out to be so.. weird? She swore that they had just been fine. And now they weren't. This crap was complicated.

They got back to the lab pretty quick and she was totally surprised that he wanted to head off to the office while she went to the lab by herself. A strange step for him since he never let her out of his site normally. She nodded and watched him go. As she stepped into the lab, Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum were waiting there in the building to be let go completely.

Good, I need you boys to get Rivers' car into the lab dock 3 please. And quickly. I mean it!

The two looked at each other and they rushed off. Blue put the Gi in it's box on the cot that she used as a bed when she was here. She put the locket on the work table that she would have to look at later. Heading through a warehouse of parts and things that was her lab, that only she seemed to know the system of.. she began to collect parts on a little cart. She couldn't replace the windows, she didn't have glass here, but she could do a lot with other stuff.

As she came up on Dock 3 the boys had just pushed his car in using the neutral status. They pulled it to a stop, put on the break and then looked at Blue for further instructions while she closed the bay door.

Good boys, report back to CheckMate, and see you next time security is needed boys.

It was a clear dismissal.

Blue tied her hair up. The long locks were always lovely but didn't do in a car when she was trying to get things done. She tied it up in a messy bun, some tendrils escaping here and there but she didn't have time to redo it. She slid into the car and closed her eyes for a moment. It smelled like John in here, like when they were on the floor... no. This was business. Blue lay across the front seat and she began to fiddle with the wires that were hanging ugly and raw out of the dashboard.

Blue went to work, fixing, altering, and bettering Rivers car.

And she hadn't even asked.

Ok, so I need a front and rear passenger window for the vehicle that I have registered in my dossier. Can you guys handle it? Its parked in front of the Warehouse laboratory.

The two guys from the motor pool nodded and went about their business as Ethan left for the lab. He figured Blue would be fine for the ten minutes he was gone, she always wanted her independence anyway. She would be more than ok, she would be ecstatic.

Except, that now...things felt weird. Things had gone from a nice thought here and there to something that could be considered real. Once he realized what a condescending ass he was, things got weird. She seemed...quiet. Blue was not one to withhold her opinion, especially when it came to "John" doing something wrong.

He walked with a brisk pace, looking forward to getting in to the storage room where he kept a hanging bag for boxing. The need to hit something really, really hard was beginning to overwhelm him. That need came to a head when he noticed a definitive subtraction from the local parking lot around Blue's lab: his car.

You've got to be fucking kidding me...

Pausing briefly to stand in the now empty spot, the urge to let a guttural scream pierce the peace of the day was fought down...eventually. Taking careful steps towards the door, Ethan almost slammed the door open, barging in to the lab.

BLUE! You won't believe...what...

His car was sitting in lab port three.

...happened.

His voice subsided quickly as he walked towards the car, now noticing Blue's thin legs sticking out from the driver's side door. The passenger door was open, and Ethan leaned in, trying to see what she was doing. It looked like she was fiddling with some wires, he had no idea. "John" had no mind for vehicles, except destroying them.

Can I just ask why you stole my car? Did Albert help you with this?

BLUE!!!!

Blue grinned as she heard her name practically screamed in frustration. Oh, the fun she could have toying with Rivers and his need to control every aspect of his life and others. That was the best part of him, well one of them.. There was also the chest.. the hair.. the smile (so rare but awesome), and.. Blue shook her head out of her thoughts and continued attatching the new wires into the system.

She was totally going to trick out his car.

He came over to the passenger side, and her multi-hued eyes looked up at him from where she lay across his front seat. Her hair spilling into the seats as she worked. He was only missing some stuff. It wasn't as bad as it seemed. Good thing he was a putz and didn't have like a top of the line car or anything.

Steal... is such a harsh word. Besides, I only moved it a few hundred feet. You just happened to have your back turned. Such a shame. Anyway, do you really think Albert, the little owl helped me do this? I can hot wire you know. But I didn't have to. That's what the assholes from CheckMate are for.

She gave him a sarcastic little grin and went back to work. To be honest, she was certain he would like all the changes she made to his car. And he would probably really be surprised by some of the features she would add. She wasn't going to make the car have guns or anything. That would take more than an afternoon. She was just going to repair the damage but make it a hundred times better.

Don't be pissy. Go take a load off. At least, outside of windows, you'll have your car better than normal in a couple hours. Tell the guys at the motor pool where to deliver the glass for your windows.

Blue picked up a device. It looked like a small screen and began to attatch it to the dash board humming softly under her breath as she worked. Her fingers just seemed to know what to do. She was truly a genius at what she was doing. It was why she loved her job. The long hours, the crappy food, the lack of sleep. It was all worth living the dream. To get paid to do what she would do anyway.. was paradise.

You know I have to admit, if I thought about myself laying in your car, I figured it'd be the back seat. she teased him without looking at him.

It seemed blue was back to her snarky old self once again. "John" nearly laughed out loud at how fast she changed back to that flirty banter. Although, he could appreciate that she got those idiots from CheckMate to do her dirty work before they left. Especially since they were supposed to leave hours ago...maybe Ethan hit them harder than he wanted it? Selective amnesia? Either way...it was funny.

Don't be pissy. Go take a load off. At least, outside of windows, you'll have your car better than normal in a couple hours. Tell the guys at the motor pool where to deliver the glass for your windows.

"John" nodded and started to retreat from the car. When Blue was in it, he couldn't rightfully call it "his." She had control over all things electronic, and it was like they all communicated with one another. Hell, he was partially worried about the things his car could say about him.

I'll be in my space in Storage Room C. Intercom me if you need me. Come on Albert, I know you're following me.

He left just as the muffled response left her mouth, giving him pause. Did she just really throw that at him? Shaking his head, Ethan thought it best to leave it at that and headed to his room/space, holding the door for the little mechanical owl to come in.

Taking off his shirt, Ethan taped his hand up and began working the bag. He had gotten used to Albert being around all the time. For the next forty minutes, however, it was just the heavy bag, his fists, and his sweat.

He left.

And took Albert with him. She had tossed something, she wasn't even sure what, at his back. But she didn't care. It didn't hit him and she went instantly back to work. Diving back into it and losing herself in the wires and fuses. She worked and worked until she decided to check in on Albert to see what Rivers was up to and paused. Laying in the seat of his car she watched him moving. Dancing and hitting around the bag. He was covered in a sheen of sweat.

~Capture~

She put it as her wall paper on her phone, computer, and then went back to work. Humming softly as she worked on installing everything that she thought he would need in a car set for a Badass Bodyguard/Babysitter. The boys came by with the windows and she helped them install the windows so that it went that much faster and to get the Ass Grabbing Alex out of her lab that much quicker.

Blue was done. The car was washed, polished, and waxed. It was shining and lovely as it sat waiting for it's owner while Blue walked to the Intercom.

If you're done practicing your male stripping, I need you back in Bay 3 for something to do with your vehicle. Thank you.

When he came back. Blue was sitting on the edge of his hood by the front head light and eating a pack of twinkies. Not that she hadn't just had lunch two hours ago, but Blue always had room for Twinkies. She looked up at the sound of his steps and she stood up tossing him the keys that she had gotten. She pointed to the car.

Okay so.. let me walk you through this. Everything is pretty much the same except I installed the same security system on your car as I have in the tank. Anyone touches this vehicle with intent.. trying to open it or .. breaking the glass, and instantly they're stunned with electricity until you get back. Handy, huh? Then, here, just incase they some how get away, this will take a 360 degree picture.

She turned the car on to show him all the buttons on his dashboard now.

Okay, this is the radio.. which .. yay.. but the really cool stuff is this. If you press the green button, instantly, your GPS screen is going to come up. Not only will it give you the map of the area, but if you push this blue button on the screen, it will show you my exact location. Once I fix the locket anyway.

She looked over at him, hoping that he liked the changes that she had made. She had also tuned the engine and done an oil change, but those weren't really important.

When the intercom went off, and Blue's message came through, all Ethan could do was narrow his eyes at the box that referred to him as a male stripper. Swinging his vision to the mechanical bird that always watched him, "John's" eyes glared at the owl, who seemed to have no real comprehension of what "John" was trying to get across.

Always in cahoots with her, aren't you? Spying on me...cyborg avian pervert.

Wiping himself down with a towel, Ethan took his time cleaning up before putting his shirt back on. If it was urgent, Blue would've sounded more...urgent. Thankfully, the exercise and sweating put his mind far more at ease and "John" felt about as relaxed as possible, considering the massive dumbassery he had put everyone through today. Of course, by everyone, he meant her.

Blue.

Things had gone from good to better to way worse to amazing. Yet, now he didn't know where they stood. Even though this violated every protocol of both New Dawn's playbook and Paladin's covert operations manual. Ethan dare not think it but...he thought he might be Echo Charlie status.

Emotionally Compromised.

That wasn't anything anyone wanted in covert operations. That could get Ethan killed....or worse.

Walking in to the lab bay, he found his car, new windows and all, all shiny and new. The greatest gift of all was sitting on the hood...but he would never tell her that. But Gods help him, he wanted to. Blue showed him all the features and neat things that his car could do, and Ethan genuinely smiled.

Blue...this is amazing. You didn't have to do all this. That electric thing is really cool. I wish we had a CheckMate guard so we could test it.

Not being able to help himself, "John" threw his arms around Blue and gave her a big hug.

Thank you, Blue.

Maybe the day was looking up, especially after all that crap, she was still willing to do this awesome gesture for him.

==END OF THREAD==